Research by cloud technologies provider VMware indicates a major divide between an organisation's senior leadership and IT decision-makers over security management concerns and data breach policies. The question remains: what can be done to bridge this gap?
Let's start with the facts: in a survey of IT decision-makers (ITDMs) across South Africa, almost 35% of the surveyed ITDMs stated that the board and C-level executives should be held accountable for any major data breaches resulting in significant damages to the organisation.
Furthermore, only 16% believed that leadership should focus more on cyber security, which explained why only 20% of those interviewed could link the efficiency of the IT department to cyber security risks.
What is more worrisome is that more than half (52%) of ITDMs admitted the organisations were lacking a proper security plan in case of data breaches and cyber attacks, or they were not aware whether such a security policy existed or not.
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The problem extends from leadership disinterest to questionable employee behaviour, considering that almost half (47%) of staff use mobile devices to access corporate data.
VMware recommends the following steps to improve cyber security across the organisation, starting with developing a better connection between top management and the IT department.
* Enable open communication between management and IT decision-makers through collaborative business applications.
* Train your staff to be aware of cyber security and the implications of data breaches to the entire organisation.
* Provide end-to-end mobile security for employees using their devices to access data.
* Implement and integrate an information security management system (ISMS) in the structure of the organisation.
* Secure your cloud-based and virtualised network architecture to prevent and react promptly to data breaches, malware, and cyber attacks.
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